The Great Escapades
by MonochromousRainbow
Summary: While guarding the Gaang, Toph and Sokka are kidnapped by the Fire Nation. Now they must find a way to escape-and possibly try to take down the Fire Nation from the inside. Eventual Tokka, Spoilers for Western Air Temple. Rating may go up later.
1. Chapter 1

When Sokka woke up, he was sweating. He had just had another nightmare. It was always the same one: the day the Firebenders took his mother.

"_Mom! Mom!" _

"_Katara, come on! We've got to get out of here!" _

"_But Mom is still in there, Sokka! We have to get her! We need to help her!"_

"_There's nothing we can do! Come on!"_

Sokka looked around his room, finishing separating the dream from reality. When he felt his heart rate calm down, he got up and put on his pants before trudging down the hallway to the kitchen, hoping to get a cup of water and calm down.

"Hey, meathead."

Sokka smiled lightly. "What are you doing up at this time, Toph?"

Toph was sitting on a stool in front of the table, her feet perched on top of it in a way that would have given Katara a heart attack. He grabbed a glass before heading out to the fountain.

"Couldn't sleep. Hey, that water you're getting? Get me some too, will ya?"

Sokka mutely turned back and grabbed another glass, filling them both and returning to Toph.

"So why are _you_ here?" she asked before downing her water.

"Bad dream," he said, slowly drinking his own water.

Toph nodded, but didn't say anything else. The two of them drank their water in a comfortable silence for a few minutes before Sokka excused himself again to try and get back to sleep, wishing Toph happy dreams when she went to bed herself.

He had nightmares the rest of the night.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: I'm still messing around with the characters a bit and planning out the plot in my head. I do love writing this story, though, and not only because I'm writing from Sokka's point of view. Something about him is fun to write. Reviews are loved.

Also, sorry if this keeps popping up in Emails. I'm still learning the whole uploading process.

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When morning came, Sokka didn't feel much more rested. But he got up regardless, because warriors don't sleep in, and grumpily trudged down to the main level, where Zuko and Aang were already meditating.

Mumbling to himself about morning people, he made his way to the bathroom, planning on shaving. However, when he crossed the kitchen to get to the bathroom, he noticed Toph sitting at the table in the same position that she was in when he left her the night before.

"Did you… sleep?" he asked.

"Nope," she answered. "Didn't feel like it."

"Why-" he yawned "-not?"

"Somethin' doesn't feel right," she told him. "I dunno. It's not somethin' to worry about." She swung her feet off of the table. "'S still early. I'm gonna try and get some sleep."

Sokka nodded and continued his journey to the bathroom, mulling over what Toph had said. She hadn't ever had any "feelings" about how things would turn out, or if she did she didn't tell anyone, so he didn't know whether to put much faith into that or not.

They all felt uneasy. The Fire Nation prince – the one who had hunted them for _months_ all over the world – was staying with them, and often alone with Aang, the one he had been trying to kidnap for a long time. Ozai was trying to take over the world, and they didn't know if he had found their location or not. They had to go up against the entire Fire Nation, and there were only a handful of people on their side. Their last attack had gone horribly wrong, and they had all left people behind. They didn't know how their loved ones were.

But Toph didn't stay up because of bad feelings. As he lathered up his face with the shaving cream and let the cold blade sweep across his skin, he realized that he didn't really know if she did or not. He hadn't watched her properly; his attention had been on Katara hating Zuko and Zuko training Aang. Toph had been pushed to the back of his mind.

Sokka felt a wave of guilt rush over him as he rinsed his face off. He locked eyes with himself in the mirror and promised himself that he would pay more attention to Toph; their patchwork family was small, and he was hell-bent on keeping it intact. The four of them – Katara, Aang, Toph, and himself – had been through a lot together, and they were all that they had.

Sokka walked to where Zuko and Aang were meditating in the main room and sat down to observe, letting his head droop, and eventually falling asleep.


	3. Chapter 3

When Sokka woke up, it was bright. That was the first thing he noticed. The second was the smell of delicious food.

"Sokka, come on!" Katara demanded.

Sokka quickly woke up and rushed to the small circle of his friends, all eating their breakfast. Toph, with dark circles under her eyes, was sitting with Zuko (engaged in conversation with Aang about the day's plans) to her left, and an empty spot to her right. He took the empty spot, briefly brushing against her arm as he settled down with his rice.

"Sokka? Do you have any ideas?"

"Huh?" he said around a mouth of rice, spewing it everywhere. Katara wrinkled her nose before replying.

"Toph thinks we need more protection here."

"Hey, I'm just sayin', we're like sitting ducks here! What're we gonna do if someone finds us?" Toph defended.

Sokka contemplated the situation for a moment, stuffing more rice into his mouth. "We could do guard shifts. That's what we did right after most of the men left to fight, remember?" he asked Katara, allowing more rice to spew from his mouth. "Let's see, morning shift, afternoon, evenin', and overnight. There're eight of us, so we should do groups of two."

"Sounds like a plan to me," Toph said, stretching and arching her back, which emitted a few popping noises. "Who gets what shift? I ain't doin' mornin's, though."

"Zuko and I will," Aang volunteered, surprising Sokka. He hadn't realized that his conversation with Toph and Katara had commanded the attention of the entire group. "We're up early anyways; it won't be a change for us."

"Katara and I can take the afternoon shift, right Katara?" Haru volunteered.

Sokka narrowed his eyes at his rice. "No, I don't think that would work. I think it would be better if you went with Teo, okay? And The Duke and Katara would work better together."

Haru looked down, but didn't argue. Katara, on the other hand, did. "Hey, why don't I get a say in this?"

Sokka quickly went through a list of excuses in his head before settling on, "We can't have two non-benders working together. The team would be unbalanced." Katara huffed slightly, but made no further arguments.

"That leaves you an' me, huh Meathead?" interjected Toph, either unaware or unaffected by the slight air of discomfort that had fallen across the group after the mild tiff between brother and sister. "I think we should take the overnight shift, us being up so late all the time and all."

"I think Katara and The Duke might be better with that shift. Only because waterbending is slightly stronger with the moon," he added quickly before Katara could object. "Toph and I will take the evening shift. That work for everyone?"

With no complaints, the group finished their meal in relative silence until Aang and Zuko got up to practice more firebending and Toph laid back, putting her feet close enough to the food that Katara had to chastise her, which became another bickering fit.

It was nice to have a pattern.


End file.
